About Me

Dr. Clyde Winters, has taught in the Chicago Public Schools for 36 years. He has taught Education and Linguistic Courses at Saint Xavier University-Chicago. As a teacher in the Chicago Public Schools Dr. Winters wrote State Standards in the 1990's for the Chicago Public School system and Common Core State Standards for Social Studies. He also wrote the 6th Grade World History Lesson Plans used in the CPS in 2000.

Tuesday, July 13, 2010

The first Indo-European speakers were the Hittites. They entered Anatolia and conquered the non-IE speaking people.

I am beginning to believe that after the Hittites defeated the Hatti and Kaska and other peoples belonging to the Hurrian and Mitanni kingdoms,these people were uprooted and forced into Iran. The lost of Anatolia to the Hittites, probably forcedthese people to become nomads.

In Iran they probably formed a significant portion of the Proto-Aryapopulation. Here they may have met Indo-Iranian speaking people,who may have practiced a hunter-gatherer existence, that adopted aspects of their culture , especially the religion and use of Mitanni religious terms and chariot culture.

Joining forces with the Mitannian-Hurrian exiles they probably attacked Dravidian and Austronesian speaking people who probably lived in walled cities. The Austronesian and Dravidian people probably came in intimate contact during the Xia and Shang periods of China.

I have to reject the Afghanistan origin for the Indo-Iranian speaking people because the cultures there in ancient times show no affinity to Indo-European civilization.

Given the Austronesian and Dravidian elements in Sanskrit and etc.,I would have to date the expansion of the Indo-Aryan people sometime after 800 BC, across Iran,India down into Afghanistan, since the Austronesia people probably did not begin to enter India until after the fall of the Anyang Shang Dynasty sometime after 1000 BC. This would explain why you declare that "the Vedic and Avestan mantras are not carbon copies of each other", they may have had a similar genesis, but they were nativised by different groups of Indic and Iranian speakers after the settlement of nomadic Hurrian and Mitanni people in Iran.

The Tamil speakers have had a tremendous influence on World history because this group spread into Europe, India, Central Asia on into China and Japan. It appears that the first waves of Dravidian speakers (especially Tamil) went to Asia in search of metals which they exported back to Middle Africa.

The Tamil history is interesting because while one group separated from the main body in the Indus Valley to settle much of South India, another group migrated into China and founded the Shang Dynasty. These Tamil speakers were forced out of China, through Yunnan, across Southeast Asia and through Tibet back into India. This explains the influence of Dravidian (Tamil) on so many languages in Europe and Asia, including the Islands of the Pacific and Indian Oceans.

Once you recognize the history of the Tamil in Anatolia, as represented by the Kassites, and the fact that the Hattic, Hurrian and Kaska people also belonged the C-Group (or Kushite) people who left Nubia in search of metals after 3500 BC explains why Dravidian languages are at the base of Sanskrit and the Pakrits. Although the original "Aryans" spoke languages related to the Dravidian group when they entered India they came to settle new lands in where the majority of the population lived in city-states instead of an Empire with a central administration.

The Hattic, Kaska and Kassite people desperate for land because the Hittites, the first Indo-European speakers had forced them from Anatolia sent these nationalities eastward in search of new lands. Under the Elamites and original Persians these nomadic people were unable to establish themselves in Iran, except among the hunter-gather groups which may have been composed of the Proto-Indo-Iranian speakers.The Anatolians probably intermarried with Iranian speakers and probably adopted many Elamite/Old Persian terms, and like the Elamite/ Old Persians used the term Arya to denote their Anatolian heritage as rulers and elits.

Consequently, when the Aryans (Kassite, Hurrian, Hattic,and Iranians) probably entered India and found much of the authority situated in city-states (walled villages) the Aryans (Kassites, Hattic, Hurrian and Iranian speakers) were able to concentrate their forces and easily overthrow the Dravidian City-States and thus conqueror the North. The nomadic nature of these Aryans and led to their lost of the polish and sofhistication they manifested when they were the rulers of Anatolia.

As a result, there were probably numerous attempts of the Vedic people to return to Anatolia and recapture their heritage. But over time Europeans and Gutians took control of the region and they were forced make India the center of their culture and civilization.

If this is an accurate account of the origin and spread of the Indo-Iranian people to India, it would appear that the Indo-Iranian people would have remained a significant minority in India if not for the fact the India they entered was made up of City-States , instead of an Empire with a centralized polity and military.

The BRW tradition originated in Nubia and spread first to theIndus Valley and thence to India. The earliest occurrence of BRW inSouth Asia, occurs on the Kathiwad peninsula, parallel ware has beenfound at the lowest levels of Harappa and Lothal dating to 2400 B.C.(Rao 1972) Dr. Nayar (1977). has shown that the Harappan BRW hasaffinities to predynastic Egyptian and West Asian BRW dating to thesame period. Rao (1972) has established the unitary nature of the BRW industry from Nubia to India.

The Harappans were masters of hydraulic engineering.TheseDravidians were a riverine people that practiced irrigationagriculture. They had both the shaduf and windmills.The Indus region is an area of uncertain rains because it islocated on the fringes of the monsoon (Fairservis 1987, p.47).Settlers in the Indus Valley had to suffer frequent droughts andfloods. Severe droughts frequently occurred in the Indus Valley so thepeople dug wells to insure for themselves a safe supply of water. J.M.Kenoyer, in Ancient cities of the Indus Valley Civilization (OxfordUniversity Press ,1998) maintains that a combination of extensiveflooding and shifti ng rivers destroyed the agricultural foundations ofthe Indus Valley and led to many Dravidians migrating out of theHarappan cities.

To compensate for the adverse ecological conditions, the Harappans settled sites along the Indus river (Fairservis 1987, p.48).The Dravido-Harappans occupied over 1,000 sites in the riverineIndus Valley environments where they had soil and water reserves. The Harappan sites are spread from the Indus Valley to Ai Kharnoum in northeastern Afghanistan and southward into India. In Baluchistan and Afghanistan Dravidian languages are still spoken today. Other Harappan sites have been found scattered in the regions adjacent to the Arabian sea, the Derajat, Kashmir and the Doab.

The Harappans were organized into chiefdoms, averaging between two and five acres (Fairservis 1987). The Harappans weresedentary-pastoral people organized into various corporations such as sailor-fishermen, smiths, merchants and farmers. The Harappans also possessed the social technology of writing seals.

The Harappan sites are small and occupy only a few acres withlittle depth. This suggests that the Dravidian speaking colonistssettled the Indus Valley over a period of a few decades (Fairservis1987,p.46). Fairservis (1987,p.47) has shown that the site ofMohenjodaro was occupied for around 200 years.

The Indo-Aryan speaking people became strong in India after 1000 B.C. The Aryans made the Dravidians and other native Indian people into slaves like the Munda. They organized a caste system based on race.

The highest caste was based on the priesthood or Brahman, after him came the rajanya or warriors and aristocracy caste and then thecraftsmen or Varsya caste, and lastly the Sudra caste, called pariah.The Sudra represented the first Black population that lived in Indiabefore the coming of the Indo-Aryans.

In the early Indian writings the aristocracy an d warrior castewas referred too as rajanya. After the kshatriya conquered theIndo-Aryans, the warrior class was called Kshatriya. The Brahmanic civilization lasted from the 3rd to the 4th centuries B.C. During this period the Laws of Manu were written. The Laws of Manu became India's first civil and political code.

There were two Indo-Aryan migrations into India. The first wavesof Indo-Aryans arrived the Indo-Iranian borderlands when ecologicalconditions had improved. These Indo-Aryans began to settle areasformerly occupied by Dravidian-speaking Harappans.

As the Aryans moved southward other Dravidian-speaking groups living in isolated villages in the Punjab and Haryana, probably allowed

Indo-Aryan tribal groups to settle in their respected urban centers.This would explain the association of BRW with PGW in the Punjabdating between 1000-1300 B.C.( Singh 1982, p.xli). It would alsoexplain the mention of the highly developed civilization of thenon-Indo-Aryan speakers in the Rg Veda.

The second and major wave of Indo-Aryans probably entered northern India around 1000-800 B.C. This would explain why almost all the dependable PGW dates cluster around 800-350 B.C.(Agrawal & Kusumgar 1974, p.132).

By the advent of the second Indo-Aryan migration the Dravidianswere weakened by drought and famine and they were easily defeated and pushed out of the Gajarat. The PGW folk appears to have pushed the Dravidians into the Dekkan.

Due to the early Dravidian presence in Northern India there is aDravidian substratum in Indo-Aryan. There are Dravidian loan words in the Rg Veda, even though Aryan recorders of this work were situated in the Punjab, which was occupied around this time by the BRW using Dravidians.

Emeneau and Burrow (1962) have found 500 Dravidian loan words in Sanskrit. The Dravidian loans in Indo-Aryan are expected to reach 750. Indo-Aryan illustrates widespread structural borrowing fromDravidian in addition to the lexical loans. For example, Kuiper(1967) has noted the increasing frequency of Dravidian type retroflexconsonants in Indo-Aryan. Southward (1977) has also recorded theDravidian structural features borrowed by the Indo-Aryans.

A new hypothesis about Indo-Aryan has been advanced by Dr. K.Loganathan (Loga). Dr. Loganathan has presented convincing evidence that Sanskrit is really a form of Tamil, which is the base of this writing system. He has also shown a close relationship between Vedic and Sumerian, by way of Tamil.

Due to early Dravidian settlement in Northern India there is a Dravidian substratum in Indo Aryan. There are Dravidian loans in the Rg Veda, even though Aryan recorders of this work were situated in the Punjab which occupied around this time by the BRW Dravidians.

There are islands of Dravidian speakers in Afghanistan, Iran and Pakistan. There are over 300,000 Brahui speakers in Qualat, Hairpur and Hyderabad districts of Pakistan. There are an additional 40,000 Brahui in Emeneau and Burrow (1962) found 500 Dravidian loan words in Sanskrit. In addition, Indo-Aryan illustrates a widespread structural borrowing from Dravidian in addition to 700 lexical loans (Kuiper 1967; Southward 1977; Winters 1989).Iran and several thousand along the southern border of Russia and Yugoslavia. (ISDL 1983:227)

Emeneau and Burrow (1962) have found 500 Dravidian loan words in Sanskrit. the number of Dravidian loans in Indo Aryan is expected to reach 750.

There are numerous examples of Indo Aryan structural borrowings from Dravidian. For example, the Bengali and Oriya plural suffix ra is analogous to the Tamil plural suffix ar. Both of these suffixes are restricted to names of intelligent beings. (Chatterji 1970:173) Oriya borrowed the gura plural suffix from the Dravidians. (Mahapatra 1983:67) The syntax of the Indo Aryan languages is ambivalent because of the Dravidian influence on these languages. As a result, they represent both SOV and SVO traits.